There are federal clean water requirements that require water bodies such as lakes and rivers must meet strict minimal water quality specifications. To achieve these requirements, stormwater drainage pipes often require treatment before conveying stormwater into receiving water bodies. As a result, a wide variety of technologies have been developed to treat stormwater and improve the water quality. A common variety of stormwater treatment systems are hydrodynamic separators such as baffle type boxes and vortex systems. However, over time stormwater treatment systems often will fill with collected debris and will require service to remove the collected debris.
The servicing of a stormwater treatment structure typically requires the use of a vacuum truck that will suck out the collected solids and water within the structure. After the vacuum truck removes the debris and water from the stormwater structure, the vacuum truck transfers those contents to a processing facility for proper disposal. However, servicing stormwater structures is often complicated by unwanted water flow running into the stormwater structures during the service procedure. This unwanted water flow typically originates from high water levels in lakes and rivers adjacent to the treatment structure, or from an upstream base flow.
While the vacuum truck is removing water and debris from the treatment structure, water sometimes continues to flow in. Often the amount of water flowing into the treatment structure during servicing exceeds the rate at which the vacuum truck can remove the water. Having water enter the stormwater structure during servicing procedure reduces the effectiveness and efficiency of the service procedure and results with having the vacuum truck to dispose of additional water.
There have been attempts over the years to try to use various damper or gate type systems, such as the aluminum slide and weir gates manufactured by Northcoast Valve & Gate Inc., and slide gates manufactured by Halliday Products Inc. The common problem with damper or gate systems used in the prior art is that they are either difficult to install and use, or they leak badly. Additionally, these gates are too heavy and cumbersome for a single person to unlock and lift, and instead usually require two or more persons to operate which adds extra expenses and time.
Thus, the need exists for solutions to the above problems with the prior art.